What is the date you began writing this memoir and the date when you completed the memoir? I began writing in 2000 and finished up in 2004.
Where did you do most of your writing for this memoir? And please describe in detail. I wrote this memoir in my study in my house at the time in Hallowell, Maine (BELOW). The study was a room on the first floor with no door. There was a wall of books in that room and my computer, where I wrote the memoir, was lodged on a sort of desk/ledge in front of the wall of books.
What were your writing habits while writing this memoir- did you drink something as you wrote, listen to music, write in pen and paper, directly on laptop; specific time of day? I have never been strong in the writing habits department. I wrote the book on my computer—a PC—but not every day. I wrote from a list of topics I had written down a legal pad by hand. Basically I wrote the book from that list. So, in a sense, the writing took care of itself. Once I had the list, I had the book.
Out of all the specific memories you write about in this memoir, which ONE MEMORY was the most emotional for you to write about? And can you share that specific excerpt with us here. The excerpt can be as short or as long as you prefer, and please provide page numbers as reference. The memoir is about a way of life—living off the grid. My main memory—and it is highly emotional for me—is the vision at night of the house where my family and I lived, looking at the house from the outside, so the light of the kerosene lamps would be visible. Here is the passage:
“The lamps were fussy, for the wicks had to be adjusted to throw the most light without blackening the chimney. I took this attentiveness as one of the gifts that simple living provided. The lamps and the poems were really the same. They were a sweet labor. They formed shapes that were predictable yet unique. They were alive. When I looked at the house from the outside as I was coming back from the woodshed or outhouse, there was a soft glow inside it. Many a time that glow stopped me in my tracks, it was so beautiful. All around was forested darkness, but the house shone gently.” The Road Washes Out in Spring page 11.
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Can you describe the emotional process of writing about this ONE MEMORY? I knew the vision of the house at night was at the heart of what I wanted to write, so I knew it would come up early in the book. To write it out was wrenching—the moment was so palpable to me, so quintessential, yet gone, in the past—but also uplifting in the sense that I lived this. I knew the intense beauty of this moment and experienced those moments over days, months and years. So I felt thankful too in writing it out.
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